The Other Side of Tiger Conservation

(The 'Kanha as a Moveable Feast' Series)

This article series derives its spirit from ‘A Moveable Feast’ a memoir written by the famous American author Ernest Hemingway. In his memoir, he wrote that if one has lived somewhere passionately, it remains with you, nourishes you, wherever you go. My long years at Kanha have been something of that kind - a landscape of memories, reflections, animals, seasons, panoramas, and, of course, questions that still travel with me, long after I bade it goodbye.

by Dr. Sanjay K Shukla

Project Tiger (now rechristened the National Tiger Conservation Authority, New Delhi, or NTCA) has been applauded world-wide as one of the most successful conservation projects. Officially launched in 1973 amid uncertainty, cautious optimism, and naysaying, even from some prominent quarters, this ambitious venture initially followed an uneven trajectory. But from the late 1990s onward, with only a few hiccups, conservation in India fared tremendously well in saving this super cat under Project Tiger. The project adopted, as an overall strategy, the concept of umbrella species management to conserve, alongside the tiger, all selected forests, ecosystems, and habitats, along with all co-occurring species, regardless of their status in nature or immediate importance.

The natural history of the world has probably not witnessed any wild species more than, or as awesome and majestic as, the tiger. Magnificence and ferocity, nonchalance and stealth, the tiger displays a mix of all these attributes and emotions almost simultaneously. Aptly described as the “spirit of the Indian jungle”, the beast has evolved into a physically powerful and strong carnivore over millennia. The tiger once commanded an extensive distribution in the world. Highly adaptable, the animal has survived a wide temperature range, varied climates and topographies and diverse forest and habitat types. An amazing predator, an adult tiger has a very protective skeletal system and a strongly built muscular body. The two strong forelimbs, reinforced additionally by the body weight with retractile sharp and curved claws, help the hunter grab and hold its prey tightly. Gifted with strong jaws and a formidable dentition of around thirty teeth of four types, the beast is extraordinarily agile and swift for its huge weight.

As per the latest 2022 tiger estimation, India supports a total population of 3,682 tigers (3167-3925) spread across 18 states. Now tigers are precariously restricted to 13 tiger range-countries, numbering only around 5575, and India still supports around 75% of the world population. It is heartening that despite such a wide range of problems so typical of a developing country, we are taking lead in tiger conservation. Having been dedicatedly conserved over the past 50 years against a wide range of threats, including population pressure, poaching, and habitat loss, the tiger now rightly lives in the hearts of millions of Indians. Ironically, the tiger’s own magnificence and tremendous power, coupled with a vast range of eulogies emanating especially from South Asian religions, cultures, and folklore, has elevated it to an almost mysteriously divine status—making it regarded as almost immortal! Thus, the news of a tiger death is always received with disbelief, suspicion, and anger by a large section of society. The statistics are worrying, and according to newspaper reports, Madhya Pradesh lost 224 tigers between 2021 and 2025. It is certainly no consolation that by May of this year, an additional 32 tigers have died, even though a large percentage of these deaths are natural.

by Dr. Sanjay K Shukla

Needless to say, with India now a vibrant democracy, each tiger death, especially in a protected area, evokes stern and angry responses, which unfailingly make headlines in the media and is discussed passionately. The irony that rising tiger numbers lead to more deaths, driven by territorial infighting, dispersal movements, and subsequent natural mortality, is somehow lost when emotions run high. Understandably, the management of the concerned protected area has to go on back foot and receive a lot of flak from all quarters.  While tiger poaching cannot be ruled out even in the best of wildlife protected areas islanded in a vast sea of humanity, the public never acknowledges that tigers, being mortal, may also die naturally due to various causes. Park managers often have very hard time explaining about the "naturalness" of such deaths, and there is hardly any taker!

The Conservation Paradox: More Tigers, More Deaths

In spite of such strength and agility, the lives of tigers are not easy in the wild. Even these super predators have to work really hard for survival! Unlike in the captivity where a tiger may survive up to twenty years, or even beyond, under excellent veterinary care, the average life span of a wild tiger generally does not go beyond ten-twelve years. Causes of natural deaths include debilitating old age problems, serious illnesses or grave injuries sustained in infighting. Besides, several viral diseases such as Canine Distemper, Carnivore Parvovirus, and Rabies also have the potential to cause many deaths within a short period of time. Even poaching, as mentioned earlier, by poisoning, electrocution, or gin-trapping cannot be ruled out.

Kanha is renowned worldwide for a good population of tigers. The viability of this population is reflected by frequent sightings/ photo-captures of animals of all ages and sex classes. The core zone is regarded as a well-monitored high tiger-density area. The dynamics of this population also bring forth certain innate behavioural attributes and tendencies of tigers giving rise to serious infighting and resultant deaths. Some of the main behaviours may include: territoriality, mating fights, perceived rival threats, and resource completion etc. My long years at Kanha also facilitated me to draw basic inferences regarding tiger social organisation and spacing strategy therein through observation, structured monitoring, and field-based consultations.

by Sudhir Mishra

Generally regarded as solitary animals, tigers also show instances of sociability with tigresses and cubs sired by them.  We can also draw an analogy to understand their social lives. Like our human society, where we are bound together through persistent interactions, interests, status, roles and networking; a tiger population also has to survive under a complex social organization. Tiger movements and its interactions more or less fit into a range-territory concept/ notion. Guided by evolutionary tendencies to make most of natural resources for survival and procreation against the rivals, tigers roam about a large area known as a home range. A territory, however, is a smaller area within a home range, and is aggressively defended against rival-tigers and intruders. Generally, the territories of adult male tigers, if they are not siblings, are non-overlapping. The territory of an adult tiger, however, overlaps with three to five adult tigresses, which show philopatry - staying close to their birth place. These territorial resident tigers are usually not less than four or five years old, and have already undergone the transient or floater phase after separating from their mothers and reaching the age of about two years. In this backdrop of social organization, there exists a land tenure system whereby older and weaker tigers are gradually squeezed out by younger and more powerful ones so that they in turn may establish their territories and mate with tigresses. Now this whole systemic and tenurial complex gives rise to tiger infighting in this tiger population. 

Tiger infighting could arise out of the following conditions: Firstly, a transient tiger, separated from his mother, a greenhorn, younger and behaviourally too inquisitive and explorative and relatively unskilled gets into fights with either another transient or a powerful resident tiger and gets killed, sometimes after fierce fighting. Secondly, two resident tigers may fight for territory or over a female and the weaker may get killed on the spot or be injured seriously to die later of his wounds.  However, sometime sibling resident tigers are known to tolerate each other’s presence. Thirdly, a resident tiger may kill all the cubs of a tigress, not sired by him, so that he may mate with the mother tigress to produce his own progeny. In most cases, such tigresses do mate with these tigers and produce cubs. No tigress with cubs will come into estrous and mate with a tiger. Sometimes, however, it is also seen that mother tigresses falsely court advancing tigers to divert their attention from her cubs. Infanticide has become a well-known behaviour in a high-density tiger population. Generally, however, a tiger does not kill his own cubs, and is also at times seen socially involved with the tigress and cubs. Lastly, a tiger may also kill one or all the small cubs of a tigress that he perceives as rivals or a future threat to his domain. Such killings may or may not be followed by mating after some time. This type of infanticide is characterized more by instantaneous perceived threat, aggression or dominance than sexual proclivity. This is a strange paradox that tiger deaths due to infighting also indicate a thriving population which is nearing its carrying capacity in the protected area.

by Sudhir Mishra

Life and Death in Populous Areas

Unfortunately, I have seen several tiger deaths in Kanha tiger reserve after infighting. If the dead animal happened to be an adult male or female, it generally died of a punctured jugular vein, tracheal rupture, or septicaemic wounds in the face or the head that could not be healed by licking. If it was a cub, the causes of death usually were ruptured skulls and/or severed necks with deep canine holes. Associated injuries included broken shoulders, deep claw marks in the face and lacerated wounds in the abdomen. 

Tigers are also known to grow old naturally, and die of a wide range of progressive physical and cognitive declines. They may gradually lose their canines. Their muscular strength weakens rendering them debilitated for hunting. As they age, they also become vulnerable to serious infection with consequent death. Small cubs have a wide range of enemies in a protected area, including leopards, wild dogs, jackals and even snakes. Sometimes cubs also succumb to their own congenital sickness. In this way, a few tigers of different ages may die every year in a high tiger-density area of the protected area. Nothing can be done about this, and evolutionary intricacies and genetics have strong bearings on this phenomenon.

by Sudhir Mishra

The tiger is also a highly peripatetic carnivore and is known to cover over 40 km while patrolling its territory. Transients and young dispersers can cover much longer distances to find a mate or territory. If such tigers leave core zones, which are relatively secure and tranquil, and choose to travel outside through agricultural fields, forest areas, and sometimes through villages at night, they inadvertently find themselves in a hostile country, so to say. Such landscapes harbour a wide range of features that are direct and indirect threats to tigers. These features include all anthropogenic linear and non-linear infrastructure, human habitations with cattle, large toxic garbage dumps, scheming poachers, retaliatory killers, and intolerant people. Each of these features, as a threat, is self-explanatory and has the potential to seriously harm or even kill such tigers

Living with Great Success

Each tiger death within or outside a protected area is investigated under a stringent protocol mandated by the NTCA, New Delhi. Sometimes the Wildlife Crime Control Bureau also plays a role in these investigations. Modern monitoring tools, such as camera traps and radio collars, quickly identify the dead animal. Detailed postmortems help draw inferences about the cause of death. Organ and viscera samples are meticulously collected and sent to a state-level laboratory for toxicological examination to confirm poisoning.

by RB Pathak

At the outset, all tigers must be saved from unnatural deaths both within and outside protected areas. Now, as far as natural deaths are concerned, the realistic and dispassionate objective of conservation is not to remain fixated on the survival of each and every tiger. We should instead aim to establish a viable, breeding population of tigers of different age and sex classes to ensure its continued perpetuity within the PA's carrying capacity. After all, like we humans, tigers are also governed by the same ecological law. There is nothing wrong with watching tigers grow old and assisting them, if possible, to make their lives easier. Eventually, though it is sad, we have to let them succumb to their own old age-associated issues. Thus, natural tiger deaths are actually a result of their increasing numbers and the success of conservation in the country!

Now, there is another critical issue and also food for thought that tiger conservation may be nearing or crossing its success threshold, thereby causing loss of human life, insecurity and fear among villagers - the primary stakeholders in this success - who live in and around protected areas.

This revised and updated article was first published in The Week magazine several years ago.